Synchronar m1

[egomon]

Hi

I bought some time ago a Synchronar m1 watch. I'm so fascinated about the whole Synchronar story, so I decided to get one for me to.
The working watches are to expensive for me and I really like to repair led watches my self.


Before that I was reading almost every topic in synchronar forum in here.

So I carefully opend it up and there was a great amount of corrosion in the modul . I will put the pict up here to.
I think the modul is damaged too much and I can not save it.
I have not yet taking of the top of the watch (solar cell) , so I dont know whats the situation in there. Probably not good.

I think the chip is gone, the damage is to great.

I think you all here have seen worst modules then this. Should I just let it go or try to save it ( perhaps new chip) and clean it up and test it?

Thank you

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Uploaded with ImageShack.us

[J Thomas]

[egomon]

Hi. And thanks fot the comment. I really need all the help what i can get ( it's my first synchronar)
That's nice to know taht the chip has perhaps some life in it. The cover is off and the solar cell is ok.
I'm pretty tired now and will not go further today to not to destroy unwillingly something.

[img][img]http://img25.imageshack.us/img25/2996/dscn2559small.th.jpg[/img]


Here is picture of solar cell. I will look from earlier post how to remove the solar cell and do it tomorrow how it is under the cell.
[/img]

Thanks. Egon

[J Thomas]

[egomon]

Thanks for the instructions. Will start with this tomorrow.

I have some questions as well.

Use a low power solder pencil to heat the solar cell negative wire

Does the low power means not so hot solder pencil?

If the potting material is a soft gel, you can remove it by soaking it in petrol or acetone.

Yes, its soft gel, but do I have to remove first the display (digits) - its plastic, does the petrol solves that to? What about solar cell, do I remove it to? How long I have to keep it in ther?

Thank you so much for helping me. I really hope that I can bring this one to life.

[clockace]

on the outside chance that it may work, i would put 3vDC across those 2 white wires and put a magnet to one of the reeds and see if it will lite up. try the 2 reeds closest to the display. they are the date and seconds. time is the top right with the display facing you. the rust on the cover of the chip may not be a problem. the traces at the upper left corner of the chip could be corroded. be very careful when removing the sc. it is brittle and the slightest pressure will crack it rendering it useless. if you can get it to lite up at least the qc is functioning. as jeff mentioned you can use petrol or acetone to dissolve the gel. i use a liquid lighter fluid with naphta in it. you don't need to remove the display. as a matter of fact if you do try to remove it all may be lost. they are not easy to unsolder all those solder points. regards, peter

[egomon]

Hi.

This are the pictures after petrol:

[img][img]http://img10.imageshack.us/img10/3424/dscn2596small.th.jpg[/img]


As you can see the corrosion is not so bad on the other side. All the lines from the chip are in good condition, perhaps who knows, it might be working.
Solar cell is intact.

Here is the module from the other side

[/img]

The chip is damaged wery bad i think. Some of the lines are gone and the fine tuner as well, but these are wery easy to replace/repair. The qc did fall off with the petrol. If its the standard 32 qc then it's ok (have them at home, and it's easy to replace as well)

Now the next step is to remove all the corrosion from bought sides and replacing the qc and repairing lines.
What about the driver transistors? Two of them did fall off in petrol. May I still use them after proper cleaning or are they just gone. One is still attached to the board but barely. Do I need to replace them all together or is it possible to use this ones?

[img][img]http://img97.imageshack.us/img97/7233/dscn2605small.th.jpg[/img]

[/img]

Thanks again guys.

[clockace]

i think that chip is a mkII. probably shows 24hr display with leap year number w/running seconds. all the legs on the chip look good. you probably have 3 bad digit drivers[2 missing, 1 other doesn't look good]. qc more than likely not a problem to replace. i think your biggest problem is going to be the traces on the cell side of the pcb. they look pretty bad. the rust pits on the chip lid are probably just that. pits on the lid. it really cleaned up nice. maybe silver epoxy can be used to reconnect the bad traces. i have done that, alto' yours is worse than what i had to work with. with careful work you could very likely resurrect this one. peter

[J Thomas]

[clockace]

jeff, you are so right on the mkI. mkII has only 3 on the top. so it is probably a dot matrix, 24hr display like the last one i built. it is still working fine and i am getting ready to seal it up. i have been tweeking the trimmer up til now. i have it at 1-2 secs/wk and i doubt i can get better than that. egomons looks like a real challenge, but if the chip is good i think it can be done. peter

[egomon]

Thank you for all the info guys.

I'm gooing to be on vacation for the next two weeks, so the projekt will be on hold for that time. I don't know how I manage to to any holiday - will probably all day, every day thinking about my synchronar :) Until I'll get back and will continue with my M1 projekt.

I have a question about the negative-positive-negatine transistor for the digit driver.
I just look up from the internet and there are plenty of thes around and I don't know which one I do need for my synchronar.
I don't have any spare parts for my watch. Bought only this one. So I probably need completely new NPN transistors fro the M1 what I have.

I don't think that re-do the lines ( on the battery side) is to difficult for me. I will probably use silver epoxy and wire. But all this, sadly, after two weeks.

Regards Egon

[egomon]

Hi again.

I'm back from my vacation and now I have a little time to tinker around my synchronar.
I attached new Quartz Crystal and made new lines with silver epoxy. Then I made connection with two AA batteries. Only what I get was one dot lit up. I even did not used magnet to activate the watch, the dot came on as soon as I made the connection with the batteries. There was some flickering of the segments but really faint and short timed.
The dot is flickering as well

here's the photo:

[img][img]http://img826.imageshack.us/img826/6021/0000d.th.jpg[/img]



So does that mean that the protsessor is dead???

I'm really disappointed and sad. Not the ending for my vacation what I was hoping for.

...

[charger105]

Hi egomon.
Three of your 4 digit driver transistors are missing, so I wouldn't expect to see too much !
However, since the colon comes on without activation of the reeds, I'd say the oscillator circuit isn't working. Try cleaning everything again around the QC and associated resistors and traces.....even flux residue may stop it from oscillating.

Rgds,
Andrew.

[egomon]

Thank you for the answer.

Yes I know that the watch misses the 3 transistors. That's not the problem.

Should I just clean by scrubbing the surface between the traces. (something sharp?)


Flux residue- is it the gel what was inside of the watch?

Thank you- there's still hope :)


I'm happy

[egomon]

I cleaned everything again but nothing... still the deem dot is lightning up when I connect it to a battery...

[clockace]

i haven't looked at your earlier photos, but i also seem to remember digit driver transistors missing. the one that is there may also not be any good. you are not going to get digits showing without them, even if the qc is working. peter

[egomon]

Hi.

I don't have any extra parts for my mk 1 model. So I need new parts (transistors). I read from another topic that any small-signal pnp/npn transistor will do.

There are modern SMD transistors that will probably fit (SC-70 or SOT323 package). Any small-signal PNP transistor will do, e.g. BC857 or BC858. Note that the E and B connections of the modern ones are reverse. old ones, so you must solder them upside down.

Link is here:
http://www.dwf.nu/viewtopic.php?t=2940&highlight=synchronar+transistor

I'm not so familiar with tranistors. I think that the digit driver is NPN transistor.
Does anyone know exactly what kind of transistors do I need?

I think the next step for me is to solder new transistors in place and see does this do any difference at all

Tnx

[clockace]

egomon, the digit driver is a npn. print out the schematic on that link. i have found it to be very useful in repairing the pcb. you also have a lot of corrosion on the traces from the ic to the transistors. use azimuth's suggestion with the vinegar dip. i think it is on the pulsar forum. and if you scrub anything you will need to be very careful or you won't have any traces left. i have tried replacing them w/ silver epoxyw/wires, with very limited success, but it will work. there is a very good chance that the ic is ok, and the display is seldom the problem. your main task right now is the electrical connections and transistors. peter